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In 2005, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita destroyed 109 oil platforms and five drilling rigs.Î¾ Houston-based drilling companies have been evacuating non-essential workers, including Transocean, Noble Corporation, Pride International and BP.Î¾ Devon Energy's Ed Schlichtenmyer says companies were able to try out their emergency response plans during Hurricane Edouard a few weeks ago.

"Edouard was a perfect example of how we function and operate in these types of situations.Î¾ We were able to reach out to our employees, make an informed decision the day before-not wait until the next morning, but the day before-and reach out to all the employees and let them know to stay home.Î¾ If it was something where evacuations were in order, we could certainly ask 'are you evacuating?Î¾ Can you provide us with your contact' and they can provide feedback to us, and we keep track of all of our people."Î¾

"Each rig has about 100 people on board.Î¾ Even though we're not certain of the track that this storm is going to take, because there's so many people aboard these two rigs, it seemed like a sensible thing to do to began taking some non-essential people to lighten the load so that if we do need to evacuate those rigs, we can do it in a timely way."

The Oil Price Information Service says if the storm goes anywhere near refineries, gasoline production could be knocked out for about a week.Î¾